On May 8th, 1911
Besant declared
Krishnamurti the reincarnated Christ. [The following paragraph is based on the chapter “Die Trennung von der Theosophischen Geselschaft” (The separation from the theosophical society) in Lindenberg, Christoph.
Rudolf Steiner: Eine Biographie. Stuttgart: Verlag Freies Geistesleben, 1997, pages 484-504]. This had been building up for some time. Since Leadbeater had “discovered”
Krishnamurti, he had been groomed for an important role. Leadbeater researched the previous lives of an important individuality he called Alcyone, publishing his findings in a series of articles titled “
Rents in the Veil of Time” in the English periodical
Theosophist starting in April 1910
. These were collected in his book
The Lives of Alcyone. Going back 23,650 years before Christ, Leadbeater described Alcyone (whom he identified as
Krishnamurti) and the people around him over successive incarnations. Important people in the
Theosophical movement were involved in these previous lives, usually the more important the person in the present Theosophical Society, the more prominent they were in history. Leadbeater was “Sirius” and Besant was “Hercules.” Even among Theosophists his descriptions were not always taken seriously, as evidence by the limerick “In the Lives, in the Lives, I've had all sorts of husbands and wives.”
A more detailed description is offered by Alice Leighton Cleather, in a letter she wrote in 1913 and reprinted as part of a book in 1923:
"The ill-omened consequences of this influence were soon to appear before the world through the affair of Alcyone and the founding of the Order of the Star in the East . . . lf a real Indian initiate, a Brahmin or otherwise, of ripe age, had come to Europe an his own responsibility or in the name of his Masters to teach his doctrines, nothing would have been more natural or interesting. . . . But it was not in this form that we beheld the new apostle from Adyar. A young Indian, aged thirteen, initiated by Mr. Leadbeater ... is proclaimed and presented to the European public as the future teacher of the new era. Krishnamurti, now called Alcyone, has no other credentials than his master's injunctions and Mrs. Besant's patronage. His thirty-two previous incarnations are related at length the early ones going back to the Atlantean period. These narrations, given as the result of Mr. Leadbeater's and Mrs. Besant's visions, are for the most part grotesquely puerile, and could convince no serious occultist. They are ostensibly designed to prove that for twenty or thirty thousand years the principal personages in the T. S. [Theosophical Society] have been preparing for the " Great Work " which is soon to be accomplished. In the course of their incarnations, which remind one of a newspaper novel, these personages are decorated with the great names of Greek mythology, and with the most brilliant stars in the firmament. During a meeting at Benares, Krishnamurti presenting certificates to his followers, received honours like a divine being, many persons present falling at his feet. He does not, however utter a word, but only makes a gesture of benediction, prompted by Mrs. Besant. In reporting this scene Mr. Leadbeater likens it to the descent of the Holy Ghost at Pentecost.
For this dumb prophet is founded the Order of the Star in the East, which the whole world is invited to join, and of which he is proclaimed the head . . . this passive young prodigy, who has not yet given the world the least proof of having any mission at all… becomes henceforth the centre and cynosure of the T. S., the symbol and sacred ark of the orthodox faith at Adyar. As to the doctrine preached by Mrs. Besant, it rests on a perpetual equivocation. She allows the English public at large, to whom she speaks of the coming Christ, to believe that he is identical with the Christ of the Gospels, whereas to her intimates she states what Mr. Leadbeater teaches, and what he openly proclaims in one of his books, The Inner Life – namely, that the Christ of the Gospels never existed, and was an invention of the monks of the second century. Such facts are difficult to characterize. I will simply say that they are saddening for all who, like myself, believed in the future of the T. S., for they can only repel clear-sighted and sincere minds…"
Cleather, Alic Leighton. H. P. Blavatsky: A Great Betrayal. Calcutta, India: Thacker, Spink & Co., 1922. Pages 12-13.
Steiner was notably absent from Leadbeater's book. While some at the time doubtless wondered,
Steiner himself knew why. In June 1909
Besant had offered him the position of John the Baptist in the scheme – a role that was to have paralleled the one Besant imagined for him: the herald of the Christ.
Steiner had politely declined. His response was to continue to hold lectures throughout Europe on his understanding of the Christ event, which he had long termed “The Mystery of Golgotha.” The descent of God into a human body was a one-time event, central to earth evolution. From the beginning
Steiner had been clear that he would only teach what he himself perceived, and would not under any circumstances represent some party doctrine.
